A cybercriminal group allegedly stole the personal data of 2.9 billion people from a background-check company based in Coral Springs, a new lawsuit claims.
According to a press release issued by Schubert Jonckheer & Kolbe LLP, a firm investigating the breach, the April data breach at Jerico Pictures, Inc., which operates as National Public Data (NPD), was carried out by a cybercriminal group known as USDoD.
On April 8, USDoD claimed on the dark web that they had stolen the data, which analysts believe includes names, address histories, familial relatives, and Social Security numbers dating back at least three decades.
The cybercriminal group posted a database named “National Public Data” on a dark web forum. It offered to sell the database for $3.5 million, according to a proposed class action lawsuit filed Thursday in a Florida federal court.
NPD, which is based out of 1555 Heron Bay Blvd., has not confirmed the breach or what information may have been stolen, according to Schubert Jonckheer & Kolbe.
NPD scrapes data from sources that include public record databases, national and state databases, and court records, the release states. The company then sells the private data to a wide range of organizations, including background check websites, investigators, app developers, and data resellers.
According to the proposed lawsuit, the nearly three billion people impacted did not knowingly provide NPD with the information.
The data breach, if confirmed, would rank among the largest ever.
Christopher Hofmann, a California man named as a plaintiff in the court filing, said his identity-theft protection service contacted him in July to alert him that his personal information had been exposed and posted on the dark web.
Hoffman alleged that NPD committed multiple civil law violations, including negligence and unjust enrichment. He is seeking monetary relief and court-ordered data security reforms at NPD.
The data breach left those impacted at risk of identity theft and financial fraud, according to Schubert Jonckheer & Kolbe.
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